Great Wolf Lodge

My Aunt Willie Mae (well, actually my great great aunt) recently turned 100.  My mom's family decided this would be a great time to not only celebrate this amazing woman but also to have a family reunion.  The party/reunion was in Hillsboro, a little over an hour outside of Dallas.  We decided this would also be a great time to take a family vacation with all the kids to Great Wolf Lodge.

After the reunion, we drove to GWL, checked in, then headed to dinner at the Rain Forrest Cafe. 

Oh my goodness, Presley was in heaven!  If we had one of these in Austin, we would probably be broke because Pres would want to go every night for dinner!  It truly is an amazing restaurant for kids.

After dinner, we came back to the hotel and went down to the water park for a bit before going to bed.  The next day, we were there right when it opened and we stayed almost all day.  Pres had a blast!!!  Becks liked it too but he was pretty tired from all the excitement so he could only take the water park in small doses.  

I apologize for the quality of the pictures.  We took them all with our phones and the kids didn't want to sit still for any pictures, so they aren't super clear.  But you can definitely tell how much fun they had.  This only shows about 1/10 of what we did while we were there. It was so much fun and we can't wait to go back again next year!

 

Presley's First Ballet Recital

 Presley recently danced in her first ballet recital.  Her class was the youngest age group (and she was the youngest in her class) to preform.  They were "Little April Showers".  She did such a great job on stage and I'm so proud of my little ballerina!

Before we left for the recital, she got to open a special gift from Mommy and Daddy.  She got another charm to add to her charm bracelet...a pair of silver ballet slippers.

 

 I volunteered to be the backstage mom for her class, so I didn't get to actually sit in the audience and watch her dance. But I did get to spend two hours chasing around 8 little girls between the ages of 3-5.  It was a little chaotic, but so much fun.  I will definitely volunteer to do this again next year!

 

 

Blaine's the only one who got to watch her performance at the recital.  He said she did a great job, and from the little I got to see on the side of the stage, I think she was fantastic.  We are so proud of her!!!

Mother's Day

Every year on Mother's Day, I have a fantastic day with my wonderful husband and sweet little babies.  And every year on Mother's day, as climb into bed that night, I realize the same thing...I forgot to take pictures!  I spend the whole day being taken care of and showered with love and never once does it cross my mind to stop and capture it on film.

So, unfortunately, another Mother's Day has come and gone with no pictures of me with the kids.  But instead,I thought I would post a few of my favorite pictures showing why I'm lucky enough to celebrate this wonderful day.

I'm so thankful for these precious little angels and I feel so blessed that I get to be their mommy!

Our Countdown to GWL

 When we told Presley that we were going on Vacation to Great Wolf Lodge, she was so excited but didn't quite understand when we were going.  We decided to make a chain just like we had done for Christmas but with a little added element.  She is really into math is constantly asking us to give her addition or subtraction problems to figure out so we decided to work that into our chain.

 Each day she got to tear off a new piece of the chain and each piece had a different math problem on it for her to figure out.

 I love watching her count on her fingers.

 After she solved the problem, she had to write it on the chain and find the spot on the window that coordinated with the answer.

She had so much fun doing this activity.  She was a little sad the morning she came down and there were no more chains.  That lasted about 5 seconds because she quickly realized that meant we were leaving for vacation that day!

I love my sweet little mathematician!

Farmers' Market Saturdays

We've started taking Pres and Becks up to the farmers' market on Saturday mornings.  We usually stop at Starbucks and Torchy's for a little breakfast, then head over to Lakeline Mall for the Cedar Park Farmers' Market.  Pres loves it.  They have pony rides, music, and there are animals everywhere!  We usually stop to buy some carrots first because their is a stand towards the back of the market that has a bunny.  Presley loves to feed the bunny carrots and she usually makes a friend or two by giving carrots away so other kids to feed the bunny too.

We usually make Presley buy all the fruits and veggies herself.  She picks out the fruit or vegetables that look best, we give her the money, and she walks up to the front to pay for them and says "I'd like to buy these please".  Everyone there is so nice and I just love the idea that sometimes we're buying this beautiful produce from the same person that pulled it from the ground just a few days earlier. 

At this particular trip we decided to try some of their eggs.  As Presley was buying them, they showed her a picture of the chickens that laid these eggs.  You can't get that at a supermarket!

Everything always looks so pretty and is incredibly fresh!

As soon as we're done Presley always asks the same question when we get in the car:

"Can we go home and have a farmer's market lunch with all our sweet vegetables?'

So every Saturday that we go, we have all of our farmers' market goodies for lunch.

Blaine and I usually take this opportunity to have an at home date night dinner with some of the ingredients we bought.

We used the carrots on our veggie tray.

 

We made mushroom bruschetta with our mushrooms and bread we bought.

We topped it with two egg yolks that we lightly cooked in the oven for a few minutes.

The eggs were beautiful and made the most amazing sauce to dip the crusty bread in.  

I was watching a cooking show recently and the chef cooking said that he loved to top food with lightly cooked egg yolks because egg yolks are nature's sauce. I love that and I couldn't agree more!

We got some local grass fed beef that we seared and cooked until medium rare.

We sliced it thin and put it on top of our grilled bread with some Manchego cheese, homade horseradish cream sauce, arugula, and a light dusting of Parmesan cheese.  It was fantastic!

And of course, although not purchased at the farmers' market, our obligatory bottle of wine.